Monthly Archives: July 2013

If you know me, you know I like to knit a real mix of things. Sweaters and stuff but also ridiculous stuff. Maybe more ridiculous stuff than normal stuff… I’ve had this crazy pattern in my queue for quite a while and finally got to it.

I am a fan of the show Futurama. A fan in the way that I enjoy the show, but haven’t watched it in probably 6 years and didn’t even really know that the show was cancelled and brought back later until recently. I had assumed that Lucas would like the show considering that he’s worked for Matt Groening and that he likes space stuff, but apparently he doesn’t like it. Whatever.

Yarns: Jaeger Roma in light grey and Cascade 220 in dark grey, black and white. Maybe 200 yds of Roma/MC and not much of the rest.

Needles: US6

Mods: A few. The pattern is written for everything to be knit flat in separate pieces. I still made it in a few pieces, but knit all of it in the round. For mine, the body is one piece, the head is another, and the arms and legs are separate. But in the pattern, even the joints of the legs are knit separate and sewn on. I just did reverse stockinette for a few rounds to get a similar effect. The fingers are I-cord extensions from the hand stitches. If I were to do it again, I would maybe do the teeth as intarsia. I followed the pattern and knit a white rectangle and sewed it in behind the mouth opening.

Profile shot:

His eye mask is knit in one piece in the round and sewn on. I sewed his head on a little back on his body but mostly because I wasn’t paying attention! I followed the pattern and put little rounds of thin plastic into the ends of his hands and feet to keep them delineated.

I think he turned out real cute! It looked huge while I was knitting it. But it is the perfect size for the Quilted Northern double rolls that I use. He is almost 6 inches in diameter and 12 inches from his butt to the top of his antenna. Pretty big!

Here is his new home:

And the money shot!:

I hope you’re out enjoying the beautiful weather (if it’s nice where you are, too)!

Last month was Michele‘s birthday month. About a week before her actual birthday she gave me some fiber to spin. The agreement was that I would spin it in exchange for some yarn. But when I realized that I would see her on her birthday, I made it a priority to have it finished in time to surprise her with it. I’ve been pretty bad about spinning time recently, so it was good to have an incentive to get stuff done! I finished it in about four days, which is practically record time for me.

I hoped that I had, 1. split the fiber in half evenly and 2. spun the fiber at a consistent thickness. If those two things happen, then when plying I should end up with both bobbins finishing at the same time. (Same yardage on each bobbin.) But that never happens with me. And it definitely didn’t happen this time! I had like 50 yards left on my second bobbin. As always, I had to andean ply the last little bit.

Bobbin close-up:

Don’t worry, this is a full bobbin, not what was left after plying!

The goal was also for the striping to line up together when plying. That dream ended pretty soon once I started. The resulting yarn has more barber poling than I would have liked, but still came out nice looking.

Michele had requested anywhere from a fingering to a worsted. I had aimed for DK, but was closer to fingering. I wrote down how many yards there were, but I forgot. It’s more than 300 yards.

I’m excited to see what Michele makes out of it! I don’t always like the look of silk in blends (looks acrylic-like to me sometimes) but I really liked this fiber blend. Wonderful to spin and had a great sheen.

Blurry closeup!:

I was even on such a kick that I finished up some other spinning that I had started months before. But that will be for another day.

Perfect timing. I finished a pair of stranded colorwork socks just in time for the heatwave! I haven’t been knitting socks that much recently. I kind of just realized that I didn’t wear hand knit socks for most of the year. And they take me a while to make. I would rather use my fingering weight yarn for a cute shawlette instead of something to go on my feet.

But a pair of socks is required for the Epic KAL/CAL. I have had this pattern in my queue for awhile and the designer was the featured designer for the Sock Knitters Anonymous group. So I double-dipped.

Notes: These were a lot of fun! I followed the pattern to the letter. I did cut off about the last 8 rounds of the foot chart because of length. I wear an 8 1/2 and couldn’t do the final striped bands at the toe. While I was knitting my first sock, I thought it was going to be too big, but by the time I had the leg completed, it was a bit of a squeeze to get my heel through. They fit well once on though.

I tried a couple of different color combinations. I always hate to break into full skeins so I kept myself to using a CC that was either leftovers or just a 50gm skein. This was a skein that I had tried to use in another color work sock about 5 years ago and finally frogged this month! Not the most dynamic, but better than the bubble gum and unicorn combination I started with. (Okay, it was light gray and variegated pink/purple, but it was very cutesy.)

Maybe I’ll have to do some more socks! Though a colorwork sock kind of defeats the purpose of having a portable sock project because I had to carry around the chart and multiple balls of yarn!

This is my Epic KAL/CAL project #5. Now to put them in the drawer until October!